Ethics

            Philosophy of Sports May 18 Hunting, as defined by Webster's Dictionary, is the act of one that hunts, specifically in the pursuit of game. The major controversy about hunting is if it is ethical. Hunting ethics is a term that defines the true standards, conduct, and moral, judgement of a sportsman. I believe that hunting is ethical and should continue to be legal throughout the United States. As long as the hunters hunt legally, safely, and their intentions are good. Hunters should hunt during the right season and should kill and gather their game, not just shoot for fun. This is where the ethics of hunting come into play. What are the basic ethics of hunting? Each hunter has his own code of ethics he follows. In this paper I will try to explain the basic ethics of hunting that hunters follow, why we hunt, how hunting helps the economy, and why hunting is more dangerous for the anti-hunters than for the actual hunter. Jim Posewitz defines the ethical hunter, in his book Beyond Fair Chase: The Ethic and Tradition of Hunting, as "a person who knows and respects the animal hunted, follows the law, and behaves in a way that will satisfy what society expects of him or her as a hunter (Posewitz 53)." Every hunter develops a set of ethics that he or she hunts by. These are a set of rules in which he or she thinks that they should act in order to hunt fairly. Most hunters learn hunting ethics from watching other hunters or from their parents when they are introduced to hunting as children. That is if one hunter believes it is ethical to hunt using bait, then they are hunting their own ethical way. They are doing nothing illegal but some other hunters look upon this as unethical. They stick by the claim that anyone who baits is not a "true hunter." The problem with hunting comes when we try and push our ethics off on other hunters. Every hunter's code if ethics is different. However, we each share the same basics.